The Parliamentary under Secretary the Rt. Hon. Edward Timpson M.P is the guy with responsibility for child protection, reporting to Michael Gove the Min. of Education.
Rt. Hon Edwaerd Tmpson M.P
30 Victoria Street
Crewe
CW1 2JE
please write.
JW molester, Barry Snow, UK, not reported by elders, molested again, court statement
by blondie 15 Replies latest watchtower child-abuse
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AnnOMaly
Thanks Blondie!
The writer has blogged about it too.
http://charlesthomsonjournalist.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/how-i-stumbled-upon-religious-sex-abuse.html
FRIDAY, 28 SEPTEMBER 2012
How I Stumbled Upon A Religious Sex Abuse Scandal
Last Wednesday afternoon I headed to court, as I often do, to sit in on an afternoon sentencing hearing. I had checked the court listings that morning - which I do every day - and spotted a name which had been on the lists a lot in recent months. Barry Snow. I had some vague awareness that it was a sex abuse case but couldn't remember the details, so I rang the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) press office for the charges.
Nine counts of indecent assault, I was told. 'On children?' I asked. The press officer said they didn't think they were supposed to say either way. That was a nonsense, of course - all charges are public information - but the press officer's reticence told me everything I needed to know.
It was lucky that I headed to court that day, because the prosecution of Barry Snow highlighted an appalling oversight in the British legal system - and I was the only journalist in court to hear about it.
In the late 1970s, Barry Snow - a member of the Jehovah's Witness church - repeatedly molested a girl under the age of 10. When the girl's parents, who had connections to the religion, discovered the abuse, they reported Snow to the church as Jehovah's Witnesses are often encouraged to do. When the church confronted Barry Snow, he confessed everything.
The church, now aware that multiple crimes had been committed against a child, did not report these crimes to the police. Instead, the church dealt with Barry Snow internally. It gave him counseling and imposed 'sanctions' on him - although nobody remembers what they were. The sanctions didn't work. Roughly three years later, Barry Snow repeatedly molested another girl. His abuse this time around was more invasive than in the previous case. He had escalated.
Snow's crimes only came to police attention in recent years when his two victims found out about each other's abuse through mutual acquaintances and decided to report him. As a result of Snow's prosecution, his first victim's report to the church in the late 1970s was made public. Summing up before he sentenced Barry Snow, Judge Jonathan Black criticised the church's handling of the allegations. I wondered whether anybody would be prosecuted over their failure to report the abuse at the time.
This led me to a shocking discovery. Under UK law, there is no legal obligation for any organisation - be it a school, a church or a football club - to report child abuse to police. If a teacher witnesses your child being molested by another teacher and fails to report the discovery, they may be sacked but they cannot be prosecuted. Or, as child abuse campaigner Tom Perry put it to me, when your child attends any sort of school, club or church and a staff member sees them being abused, your child has no statutory right to have that abuse reported to anybody.
Campaigners, charities and lawyers are fighting to introduce a law which criminalises the willful withholding of information about child abuse, but some told me that the government simply refuses to listen to them - perhaps too embarrassed to acknowledge that the law has not existed for all these years. Most people assume - as I assumed - that such a law would exist. It seems like a no-brainer.
My reports on Barry Snow and how Britain's legal system is failing child sex abuse victims have sparked some debate. Articles on our website very rarely generate comments, with most contributors favouring our Letters Page, but these stories have attracted international attention. Here they are as they appeared in the newspaper, splashed across the front page and continued inside. -
TheOldHippie
"do the decent thing (that everyone else already knows) to protect children ?"
Well, the Catholic Church has not exactly been a front runner for an open policy on this, has it? Forced from barrier to barrier, it finally has been forced to adopt a policy which in theory looks good. I am not interested in defending JW policy when it comes to this, but there are MANY organisations that have skeletons in the closet. Child abuse and rape in general never was a priority among the police or prosecuting authorities. Jury members are still quoted as saying that a woman dressed like that has to bear the guilt herself, that a woman responding to an invitation knew what was coming - comments sounding more like coming from Moslem communities than from a Western courtroom. Great parts of modern society have a lot to answer for and are burdened with a huge amount of shame for how they have failed women and children. This is only slowly starting to be treated with the seriousness it should. Thousands upon thousands of lives have been destroyed right in front of the eyes of an indifferent society. Good that it is beginning to be changed. Sad that the WT is not a front runner, but still partially sticks to the "keep it inside the congregation" attitude and only follows what is required by law and not what according to morals should be the most natural thing to do - follow the Christ and take care of those in need. There are unlikely good elders and congregational members out there, but others are so immature and inhibited and dare not do anything that is not written on the pages of the WT.
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PaintedToeNail
bump
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JW GoneBad
Blondie this is a gem of a find.
‘Colin Brown, an elder at the Rayleigh Jehovah’s Witness church where Snow is now a member, said the organisation would not comment on individual members. Asked whether, as an elder, he would report child abuse to police today, he replied: “We do not comment on hypothetical situations. We focus on reality. We hate child abuse and focus on it as a very serious accusation.”’
Have the elders at Rayleigh JW congregation, at least, alerted the parents that Barry Snow, a known child molester is in their midst? My guess would be no!
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carla
bttt